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- The Young Carthaginian - 10/62 -

of the country, entered one or other of these bodies. The cavalry
was the arm chosen by the richer classes. It was seldom that it
numbered more than a thousand strong. The splendour of their armour
and appointments, the beauty of their horses, the richness of
the garments of the cavaliers, and the trappings of their steeds,
caused this body to be the admiration and envy of Carthage. Every man
in it was a member of one of the upper ranks of the aristocracy;
all were nearly related to members of the senate, and it was considered
the highest honour that a young Carthaginian could receive to be
admitted into it.

Each man wore on his wrist a gold band for each campaign which he
had undertaken. There was no attempt at uniformity as to their
appointments. Their helmets and shields were of gold or silver,
surmounted with plumes or feathers, or with tufts of white horsehair.
Their breastplates were adorned with arabesques or repousse work
of the highest art. Their belts were covered with gold and studded
with gems. Their short kilted skirts were of rich Tyrian purple
embroidered with gold.

The infantry were composed of men of good but less exalted families.
They wore a red tunic without a belt. They carried a great circular
buckler of more than a yard in diameter, formed of the tough hide of
the river horse, brought down from the upper Nile, with a central
boss of metal with a point projecting nearly a foot in front
of the shield, enabling it to be used as an offensive weapon in a
close fight. They carried short heavy swords similar to those of
the Romans, and went barefooted. Their total strength seldom exceeded
two thousand.

These two bodies constituted the Carthaginian legion, and formed but
a small proportion indeed of her armies, the rest of her forces
being entirely drawn from the tributary states. The fact that
Carthage, with her seven hundred thousand inhabitants, furnished
so small a contingent of the fighting force of the republic, was
in itself a proof of the weakness of the state. A country which relies
entirely for its defence upon mercenaries is rapidly approaching
decay.

She may for a time repress one tributary with the soldiers of the
others; but when disaster befalls her she is without cohesion and
falls to pieces at once. As the Roman orator well said of Carthage:
"She was a figure of brass with feet of clay" -- a noble and
imposing object to the eye, but whom a vigourous push would level
in the dust. Rome, on the contrary, young and vigourous, was a people
of warriors. Every one of her citizens who was capable of bearing
arms was a soldier. The manly virtues were held in the highest
esteem, and the sordid love of wealth had not as yet enfeebled
her strength or sapped her powers. Her citizens were men, indeed,
ready to make any sacrifice for their country; and such being the
case, her final victory over Carthage was a matter of certainty.

The news which afforded Malchus such delight was not viewed with
the same unmixed satisfaction by the members of his family. Thyra
had for the last year been betrothed to Adherbal, and he, too, was
to accompany Hamilcar to Spain, and none could say how long it
might be before they would return.

While the others were sitting round the festive board, Adherbal
and Thyra strolled away among the groves in the garden.

"I do not think you care for me, Adherbal," she said reproachfully
as he was speaking of the probabilities of the campaign. "You know
well that this war may continue in Spain for years, and you seem
perfectly indifferent to the fact that we must be separated for
that time."

"I should not be indifferent to it, Thyra, if I thought for a moment
that this was to be the case. I may remain, it is true, for years
in Spain; but I have not the most remote idea of remaining there
alone. At the end of the first campaign, when our army goes into
winter quarters, I shall return here and fetch you."

"That's all very well," the girl said, pouting; "but how do you know
that I shall be willing to give up all the delights of Carthage
to go among the savage Iberians, where they say the ground is all
white in winter and even the rivers stop in their courses?"

Adherbal laughed lightly. "Then it is not for you to talk about
indifference, Thyra; but it won't be so bad as you fear. At
Carthagena you will have all the luxuries of Carthage. I do not
say that your villa shall be equal to this; but as you will have
me it should be a thousand times dearer to you."

"Your conceit is superb, Adherbal," Thyra laughed. "You get worse
and worse. Had I ever dreamed of it I should never have consented
so submissively when my father ordered me to regard you as my future
husband."

"You ought to think yourself a fortunate girl, Thyra," Adherbal
said, smiling; "for your father might have taken it into his head
to have done as Hamilcar Barca did, and married his daughters to
Massilian and Numidian princes, to become queens of bands of nomad
savages."

"Well, they were queens, that was something, even if only of nomads."

"I don't think that it would have suited you, Thyra -- a seat on
horseback for a throne, and a rough tent for a palace, would not
be in your way at all. I think a snug villa on the slopes of the
bay of Carthagena, will suit you better, not to mention the fact
that I shall make an infinitely more pleasant and agreeable master
than a Numidian chief would do."

"You are intolerable, Adherbal, with your conceit and your mastership.
However, I suppose when the time comes I shall have to obey my
father. What a pity it is we girls cannot choose our husbands for
ourselves! Perhaps the time may come when we shall do so."

"Well, in your case, Thyra," Adherbal said, "it would make no
difference, because you know you would have chosen me anyhow; but
most girls would make a nice business of it. How are they to know
what men really are? They might be gamesters, drunkards, brutal
and cruel by nature, idle and spendthrift. What can maidens know
of a man's disposition? Of course they only see him at his best.
Wise parents can make careful inquiries, and have means of knowing
what a man's disposition and habits really are."

"You don't think, Adherbal," Thyra said earnestly, "that girls are
such fools that they cannot read faces; that we cannot tell the
difference between a good man and a bad one."

"Yes, a girl may know something about every man save the one she
loves, Thyra. She may see other's faults clearly enough; but she
is blind to those of the man she loves. Do you not know that the
Greeks depict Cupid with a bandage over his eyes?"

"I am not blind to your faults," Thyra said indignantly. "I know
that you are a great deal more lazy than becomes you; that you
are not sufficiently earnest in the affairs of life; that you will
never rise to be a great general like my cousin Hannibal."

"That is all quite true," Adherbal laughed; "and yet you see you
love me. You perceive my faults only in theory and not in fact,
and you do not in your heart wish to see me different from what I
am. Is it not so?"

"Yes," the girl said shyly, "I suppose it is. Anyhow, I don't like
the thought of your going away from me to that horrid Iberia."

Although defeated for the moment by the popular vote, the party
of Hanno were not discouraged. They had suffered a similar check
when they had attempted to prevent Hannibal joining Hasdrubal in
Spain.

Not a moment was lost in setting to work to recover their lost
ground. Their agents among the lower classes spread calumnies
against the Barcine leaders. Money was lavishly distributed, and
the judges, who were devoted to Hanno's party, set their machinery
to work to strike terror among their opponents. Their modes of
procedure were similar to those which afterwards made Venice
execrable in the height of her power. Arrests were made secretly
in the dead of night. Men were missing from their families, and
none knew what had become of them.

Dead bodies bearing signs of strangulation were found floating in
the shallow lakes around Carthage; and yet, so great was the dread
inspired by the terrible power of the judges, that the friends and
relations of those who were missing dared make neither complaint
nor inquiry. It was not against the leaders of the Barcine party
that such measures were taken. Had one of these been missing the
whole would have flown to arms. The dungeons would have been
broken open, and not only the captives liberated, but their arrest
might have been made the pretext for an attack upon the whole system
under which such a state of things could exist.

It was chiefly among the lower classes that the agents of Hanno'
s vengeance operated. Among these the disappearance of so many
men who were regarded as leaders among the rest spread a deep and
mysterious fear. Although none dared to complain openly, the news
of these mysterious disappearances was not long in reaching the
leaders of the Barcine party.

These, however, were for the time powerless to act. Certain as they
might be of the source whence these unseen blows descended, they
had no evidence on which to assail so formidable a body as the
judges. It would be a rash act indeed to accuse such important
functionaries of the state, belonging, with scarcely an exception,
to powerful families, of arbitrary and cruel measures against
insignificant persons.

The halo of tradition still surrounded the judges, and added to
the fear inspired by their terrible and unlimited power. In such
an attack the Barcine party could not rely upon the population
to side with them; for, while comparatively few were personally
affected by the arrests which had taken place, the fear of future
consequences would operate upon all.

Among the younger members of the party, however, the indignation
aroused by these secret blows was deep. Giscon, who was continually
brooding over the tyranny and corruption which were ruining his
country, was one of the leaders of this section of the party; with
him were other spirits as ardent as himself. They met in a house
in a quiet street in the lower town, and there discussed all sorts
of desperate projects for freeing the city of its tyrants.

One day as Giscon was making his way to this rendezvous he met
Malchus riding at full speed from the port.